


Driftaway With Me

by AmateurScribes



Series: RvB Rare Pair Week [3]
Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Let Carolina Have Fun 2020, RvB Rare Pair Week, RvB Rare Pair Week 2020, Scuba Diving, Sexual Humor, Stranded
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:15:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24234907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmateurScribes/pseuds/AmateurScribes
Summary: Grif and Carolina had been dating for about a month when he decides to try and do a nice outing with her.But with all things Red or Blue it ends up going wrong.
Relationships: Dexter Grif/Agent Carolina
Series: RvB Rare Pair Week [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1359715
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12
Collections: Red vs. Blue Rare Pair Week





	Driftaway With Me

**Author's Note:**

> Ah, I was worried I wouldn't be able to get something in on time for my favorite fandom event! I cut it close with this one but here it is! I have a personal headcanon that Grif likes to scuba dive, mainly because almost everyone in my family is a scuba diver. My father is a shipwreck diver and a captain, my brother is a shipwreck diver, my mother used to be one, and my uncle cave dives. But I do not do anything because I maintain black sheep status in my family, constantly disappointing them.
> 
> No Beta, so any mistakes are my own. All information regarding scuba diving came from my father, so I might have smudged some things up because he used so many terms and explanations it was hard to keep track of.

"So," there's salt on Grif's lips, and not in a petty way. "This is a bit of a predicament."

Carolina glared at him, head just above the water as he was, remarking dryly, "You think?"

Normally Grif had wonderful and ingenious plans for relaxation- it was his expertise after all- and after all that nonsense with time travel and AI's, yet again, Grif had thought it would be a good idea to restart Carolina's training of the arts of laziness. 

And laziness led way to exploring similar interests and hobbies, and a budding romance too- tentative at the moment, but the both of them were willing to put the work into it. 

Which has been fantastic so far, even if everyone was shocked that Carolina hadn't dumped him yet.

They were coming up on their one month anniversary and Grif had wanted to do something relatively nice for her. Having done a majority of the 'typical' relaxing activities that Grif had to teach her, he knew that while she was making good- but slow- progress Carolina was getting slightly antsy. 

She enjoyed sightly more stimulating activities, and while Grif typically  _ did not, _ he figured he could find some sort of common ground between the two to do something that they would both enjoy.

Which unfortunately led to the current situation.

The two of them. Adrift at sea.

"On a scale of one to ten, how calm are you right now," Grif asked, feet lazily kicking back and forth to maintain movement.

"I'm  _ calm," _ she gritted her teeth, looking out into the distance.

Noticing the edge to her voice, for safety he asked, "Follow up question, how angry are you right now and is it aimed at me?"

"I'm not-" she snapped before stopping herself and taking a deep breath to collect herself. "I am not angry at you."

"But you're still angry," Grif pointed out.

"I'm  _ angry _ at the ship for leaving without us," Carolina growled.

"Mistakes happen," he reassured, although he was pissed too. How hard was it to do a simple headcount before leaving? "And I'm sure they'll notice we're missing soon. And look," he grasped at his whistle. "I have this with me for this exact reason, I just gotta keep blowing this and maybe they'll hear it."

_ "Maybe," _ Carolina didn't seem happy with that.

It was no fault of their own about what happened. Well, at least not entirely Grif's. He figured that scuba diving could be a good balance between a recreational activity and something that would be a little more active for Carolina. The first thing he did was make sure that Carolina was certified- Grif himself was because before he signed up for the UNSC he had scrounged up enough money to take the course and test, having found the hobby interesting enough, plus he was practically raised by the ocean given how often he visited the beaches with Kai- and she had reassured him that she was.

So it should have been a perfect date activity, two certified soldiers enjoying this planet's wide ocean, and exploring just one of the many shipwrecks that the planet advertised.

Until they breached the surface and found that the ship was absolutely nowhere to be found.

Which happened, no big deal. Well, it's never happened to Grif before, but he knew that occasionally divers drifted off from the line or the boat leaves early or isn't tied down right.

And he knew what to do in a situation like this, keeping a level head so as to not expend energy panicking.

But when he had glanced at Carolina she had tensed up and a tightness grew around her eyes as he movements picked up in speed a little.

"So, when you told me you were certified, was that certified-certified or  _ Freelancer- _ certified," he had to ask because now he was slightly concerned.

She didn't respond for a minute, and really that told him all that he needed to know before she responded, "It was necessary for a mission once."

"Cool, so it was probably super illegal and the bare minimum," Grif nodded.

Carolina shot him a look, and if the water wasn't already mildly cold- and only mildly because the wet suit was doing its damn job trapping the water slowly and warming it up against his skin- Grif would have turned into an icicle from that look alone.

They didn't say anything for a while, but ever since the Iris Incident- as he referred to that period in his mind- Grif had a hard time staying quiet. Even though he really, really shouldn't be talking so much since he'd get dehydrated  _ quickly _ and that was  _ bad. _

"You know, the last time I was alone awkwardly with just one other person was with Locus," Grif said to fill the space over the sounds of the ocean.

Carolina looked at him and quirked an eyebrow, "When was this?"

"When we came to rescue you guys from Temple," he responded. "I won't lie, I was a bit out of my mind at the time, but Locus surprisingly didn't choke me out. He totally could've and honestly, I wouldn't mind."

"Ignoring that last bit," Carolina remarked. "What do you mean you were out of your mind?"

"Let's just say that if at this very moment a volleyball drifted past us I would freak out," he answered, vaguely, because he really didn't want to bring up the volleyballs again after he had punted them into that volcano.

"Ah,  _ Castaway," _ Carolina thankfully understood what he meant.

"And before that, there was this one time I was left alone with Church in a jail cell," he added, a brief memory that he had honestly forgotten about. "Jail changes a person. Although, I just want it to be on the table that there was no way in hell I was going to become Church's bitch."

Silence.

Just the two of them floating in the water, staring at each other.

"I'm just gonna go back to blowing the whistle," Grif said, bringing the whistle up to his lips. Eugh, the taste of saltwater entered his mouth. He would hate to put on his rebreather again considering it had dipped below the water a few times now whenever Grif had sunk down a tad.

"Perhaps you should considering that's gonna be the only thing  _ blown _ for some time now," Carolina stated, causing Grif to choke and sputter against the whistle, falling back against his chest.

"What?!" he gasped out. "Who taught you to say-  _ Tucker." _

Carolina let out a bit of a chuckle, saying, "You're not the only one I go to for lessons on how to relax."

"I hereby ban you from ever talking to Tucker again he is a  _ bad influence," _ Grif doesn't think his heart was gonna slow down again after that comment. He was definitely gonna deck the Blue whenever he saw him next.

"No you won't, because you may not be Church's bitch, but you're certainly mine," Carolina joked. 

Grif blinked, paused all movements, before barking out a singular laugh.

There was certainly nothing funny about this current situation, but if Carolina was able to keep composed and joke then they would be fine.

They fell into a comfortable silence after that, Grif blowing the whistle at consistent variable and for about as long as he could.

It was about an hour in when he turned to Carolina and said, "Take off your weight belt."

It was just dead weight at this point, that they didn't need holding them down. After taking it off, Grif got the lift bag and filled it with air.

"The goal is to make us look as big and bright as possible," he told her after she gave him a questioning look. "Right now we're just two little specks about the size of a penny compared to the water, and our hoods, unfortunately, make us blend in with the ocean too. I'm like, ten percent sure that this planet has some sort of Coast Guard equivalent, doing this makes it easier for them to spot us from the sky."

She nodded at the explanation and filled her own lift bag with air, and spread it out to take up more space.

"You're being very level-headed," she remarked, a tone of surprise bleeding into her voice. "I would have expected you to panic."

"Oh trust me if anything brushes against my leg I'm gonna lose it," he said. "But, nah, now's not the time for that. After I might need like, a good beer or two and maybe some cuddles?"

She gave him a slight smile, and thankfully she said, "I think we can manage that."

Slipping into brief periods of talking and stationary silence was the pattern they kept up. Grif knew that Carolina was emulating all her lessons about relaxing- and he was a touch proud of her for that- while he just nervously watched the sun get lower on the horizon.

Hypothermia was the main concern right about now. That and dehydration. Oh, and never being found too, but Grif had hope that while the crew of the ship was incompetent, that they at least notified  _ someone _ about their absence.

"I have a flare," he informed her. "In case we're still in the water tonight."

"A flare? How," she asked, voice tired.

"Here," he reached for the flashlight he carried with him, bringing it above the surface of the water. "Diver's trick. I took out the batteries and replaced them with a flare. It's no flare gun, but... it's something."

"That's smart," Carolina nodded. "I'm glad you're not Freelancer-certified."

"Me too," his mouth was starting to get dry, but whether that was from guilt or dehydration he didn't want to know. "I'm sorry, this was my idea-"

"It was a good idea," she said. "And it was... fun before this happened. Maybe next time we can stick with snorkel diving closer to the shore."

"Yeah, next time," he nodded.

Grif was going to say something else when he thought he heard the sound of an engine in the distance. Perking up, he grabbed at the whistle and started blowing, the sharp note snapping Carolina a little more awake.

A few minutes of doing that and a medium motorboat appeared on the distance. It slowed down as it got closer to them, and Grif had never been happier to see Tucker.

Pulling up, with Wash at the wheel, Tucker had a look of concern on his face, but as soon as he saw the two of them it bled into relief.

And then he opened his mouth.

"You know, if the two of you wanted to get wet you could have done it from the confines of the hotel room," he said as he reached out to pull Carolina out of the water and onto the boat. Once she was safely on board, he turned around to help Grif, exclaiming, "Bow chicka bow-  _ OW!" _

Grif smacked his hand away and pulled himself onto the boat by his lonesome.

"That's for teaching Carolina to say lewd things," he snapped, knees wobbly from not standing on solid ground in who knows how long. "Almost choked on seawater you asshole."

"Are you sure you weren't choking on something else, come on bro, we all know Carolina pegs y- OW, come on quit it!" he yelled after Grif punched him in the arm.

"Please don't quit it," Wash called back from where he was driving the boat. "If he continues, knock him off the boat."

"Don't do that," Tucker begged. "Because no offense you guys look like shit."

"Just take us back to land," Carolina said, working through her equipment to take them off. "I think I've had just about enough of the ocean for right now."

"You're telling me," Grif groaned, unloading his own equipment. "If I see anything oceanic I just might puke, which fucking sucks because there's  _ only _ seafood restaurants in the town."

"Speaking of, do you know how shitty you guys are at timing? We were all in the middle of a wonderful lunch when we heard that you guys were missing," Tucker scowled. "Then we had to find the nearest asshole who'd let us just take their boat to go out and look for you guys. We didn't even get to finish our meal."

"Whimper and weep about it," Grif scoffed, resting down on a seat, glad to be both out of the water and off of his achy legs. "Go choke on a lobster."

"Better than choking on a- ok,  _ FINE, _ I'll stop," Tucker scurried away from him when Grif raised his fist again.

Carolina sat next to him, leaning against the walls of the boat and closing her eyes.

"You're going to make this up to me you know," she told him.

"So I can get a second try, that's fair, but it's gonna be something completely relaxing, no effort involved at all," he snorted.

"Good. Then you're treating me to a spa day," Carolina said. "And I want you to invite Donut."

"Donut?! Why him," Grif whined.

"Because he'll appreciate it better than you I'm sure," she cocked her head at him. "But you have to be there too, of course."

Her hand grasped for his, and he opened it up to her so their fingers could curl together.

"Of course," he nodded.

**Author's Note:**

> Thankfully no one in my family has ever had to experience being adrift in the ocean, but one time my dad tied down the line improperly and it snapped causing the boat to drift away so when he came up it was gone, but they found him relatively quickly. He did have two friends who did get stranded in the ocean, one was adrift for three hours before they found her and another for twenty-four hours. Scary stuff. 
> 
> But it can be interesting too, recently my dad was involved with rediscovering a sunken Civil War ship, the Adriatic! And before that, he had recovered a strain of yeast that was thought to have been died out and it was made into a beer! Preserving history and documenting the slow deterioration of once-great ships is pretty interesting, at least I think so.
> 
> Anywho, if you'd like to pop in for a chat you can find me at either of my Tumblr's: @agent-murica (main) and @amateurscribes (writing).


End file.
